Rush Limbaugh Sounds Off on Akaka Bill

'''This is a transcript reprinted from the Aug. 17, 2005, Rush Limbaugh Show (airs in Hawaii on 830 AM KHVH) and taken directly from http://www.RushLimbaugh.com'''

''RUSH:'' There's been a story that we've been following on this program since its early days, and it's this bill in Hawaii sponsored by Senator Daniel Akaka, and it would basically create a racially exclusive government by and for native Hawaiians who satisfy a blood test. In other words, it would Balkanize the United States and set up a separate government in Hawaii run exclusively by and for native Hawaiians, and at first this had some support in the Senate. It had some support around the country because people didn't quite understand what it was, but there are two original supporters that have changed their mind on this. They have a piece today in the '''Wall Street Journal''', Slade Gorton and Hank Brown.

They write: "The Akaka bill classifies citizens by race, defying the express provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment. It also rests on a betrayal of express commitments made by its sponsors a decade ago and asserts as true many false statements about the history of Hawaii and it now should be defeated," and the Senate's now poised to pass this thing. "The new race-based sovereign that would be summoned into being by the so-called Akaka bill would operate outside the US Constitution and the nation's most cherished civil rights statutes. The champions of the proposed legislation boasts that they knew native Hawaiian entity could secede from the Union like the Confederacy but without the necessity of shelling Fort Sumter. The Akaka Bill rests substantially on the 1993 apology resolution passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton when we were members of the Senate representing the states of Washington and Colorado," and both of them voted against it. Remember this is Slade Gorton and Hank Brown, the authors of this piece. "The resolution is cited by the Akaka bill in three places to establish the proposition that the United States perpetrated legal or moral wrongs against native Hawaiians that justify the race-based government that the legislation would erect. These citations are a betrayal of the word given to us and to the Senate in the debate over the apology resolution."

They thought that this was just a ceremonial thing when it was first proposed, that just, "Okay we're going to acknowledge that there's some native Hawaiians and that the country was there," blah, blah, blah. No. It allows native Hawaiians to set up their own Hawaii basically and secede and basically say (raspberry) to America, and it's being sponsor by US Senator Daniel Akaka. "We specifically inquired of its proponents whether the apology would be employed to seek special status under which persons of native Hawaiian descent would be given rights or privileges or reparations or land or money communally that are unavailable to other citizens of Hawaii. We were promised on the floor of the Senate by Daniel Inouye, the senior Senator from Hawaii and a personage of impeccable integrity that 'as to the matter of the status of native Hawaiians this resolution has nothing to do with that. I can assure my colleague of that.' The Akaka bill repudiates that promise of Senator Inouye. It invokes the apology resolution to justify granting persons of native Hawaiian descent political and economic rights and land denied to other citizens of Hawaii." So Gorton and Brown say that we were unambiguously told that that would not be done, and they have changed their minds on this. They were original supporters and they've changed their mind. Akaka himself did an interview on National Public Radio, and in this interview he admitted that his bill could lead to independence for new native Hawaiian state in Hawaii. He admits it now. The relevant part of the excerpt is this:

The question says: "The sovereignty provided by your bill could eventually go further, perhaps even leading to outright independence?" Senator Akaka: "That could be. As far as what's going to happen at the end I'm leaving it up to my grandchildren and great-grandchildren." The interesting thing about this is that if you look at the NPR interview and the transcript you find that the White House is sort of AWOL on this and they're not taking a position on it because Governor Lingle wants to be a Senator, and so they don't want to upset any apple carts that would upset her chances to be a Republican senator from Hawaii.

"According to NPR, the justice department's recommended a few changes such as a safeguard for the US military presence on the island, something the bill's supporters see as a positive step. They believe it means the White House is willing to accept some version of native Hawaiian self-government."

So just to fill you in on this, it appears that the White House doesn't really care much about this, doesn't think it's a big deal if the native Hawaiians want to have their own government.
(interruption) What, Mr. Snerdley? (interruption) What? (interruption) Mmm-hmm. Well, I mean that's (interruption). Well, that's the thing. Because (interruption). Listen. (interruption) Listen! (interruption) Snerdley asked, "Why can't other groups just get their own states, like if you're a disgruntled minority in say, Georgia, why don't you just get your own state -- you know, Georgia 2 -- and get independence from the United States, and that way you don't have to pay taxes or anything else?"

You know, I may take advantage of this and move that Palm Beach, Florida where I live -- which is an island -- secede from Florida. Because, I'm telling you what, we are discriminated against down here, folks, those of us that live in Palm Beach. The floodgates could be wide open on this. But the blood test on this, you have to do is have .05 percent "native Hawaiian blood" and you causal as a native Hawaiian and you can basically tell the United States to stick it. You may have heard scuttlebutt about this in the last three or four months. Nobody thought this would get anywhere, it was so outrageous. "Okay, here are these people sponsoring this. They're just throwing a peanut or two to keep the native Hawaiians." No, it's actually something that looks like it got close to passage and it may still yet.

''CALLER:'' I'm thinking that we better chase the dollars and cents of this. Much like the American Indians had their reservation freedom and the their ability to have tax-exempt status to run their own casinos, my guess is, I can see it now, the Tiki Casino or Luau Casino on Oahu and therefore establish not necessarily a separate nation state but at least a separate taxing situation for the people of indigenous heritage.

''RUSH:'' (laughing) So in your mind they're simply trying to duplicate the actions taken bit American Injuns and get themselves set up so they can have casinos over there?

''CALLER:'' At least carve themselves a niche where they have the freedom to do that, and especially for tax reasons.

''RUSH:'' Well why couldn't they do that now? If they want to vote for it now, why vote for it now? Why do you need to revert back to some independent, sovereign state? The thing about this is you can say, "It's for this or that, don't worry about it," but, folks, a whole bunch of lies went into the resolution to make this. Everybody said, "Well, Rush, you know, Hawaii was a kingdom and we just went in there and took over that state. Why, we destroyed a sovereign country!" We did not. We did not, and Hank Brown and Slade Gorton write all about this in their piece today. "The apology resolution distorted historical truths. It falsely claimed that the US participated in the wrongful overthrow of the queen there in 1893. The US remained strictly neutral. It provided neither arms nor economic assistance nor diplomatic support to a band of Hawaii insurgents." Gosh! (Laughing) Now we're talking about "insurgents" in Hawaii, and we supported the insurgents according to the Akaka Bill. We didn't. So what's happening here is that a case was made falsely, fallaciously on the Senate floor that the US was an absolute SOB to the poor people of Hawaii, and that's what's wrong with this. It's yet another piece of legislation that seeks an apology from the US for things that we didn't do, and supposedly there have been grieving native Hawaiians ever since. Now it's time to exact their revenge, and by God they're going to exact their revenge and all you need to do to be a native Hawaiian is have .05% native Hawaiian blood and bammo! You're a native Hawaiian and you can secede from the US, get your own government, be sovereign. You can get it back. It's all based on lies. You have to understand what this is all about, folks, not just understand what it's all about, you have to understand what the practical application or impact of this could be down the road on the rest of the country. This is Balkanization. This is racism. This is basically saying that certain races can say to America, "Screw you! You savaged us and you incorporated us into your country and we didn't want to be here and you've got to let us have our land." Does this not sound strangely like the reparations movement? And you start making apologies for all this and you go down the road, and here's the White House not wanting to get involved in this because it might upset the electoral chances of Linda Lingle who's the governor, who's a Republican, who wants to be a Republican Senator from Hawaii. Yeah, I know, you couple this with all the immigration snafus we got, and can Mexifornia be far down the road? And then Mexizona and then Tex-Mex. Anyway, Rich in Ann Arbor, I'm glad you called. Welcome to the program, sir.

''CALLER:'' How are you, Rush?

''RUSH:'' I couldn't be better. Thank you.

''CALLER:'' I just -- I don't really know if I understand exactly what they're trying to get with that bill because I didn't think any of us in this country were indigenous people. We all came from somewhere else.

''RUSH:'' Well, Hawaii did have indigenous people. There were Hawaiians that were there.

''CALLER:'' Didn't they come from the South Pacific on boats and they paddled there, too? Just like we did.

''RUSH:'' Yeah, but they got there first so they, quote, unquote, discovered it.

''CALLER:'' Well, okay. Give them that, I suppose.

''RUSH:'' The point about there are no indigenous Americans, that's sort of like this term "undocumented alien." Who comes up with these terms? We know who wrote, for example, Romeo and Juliet. That was William Shakespeare, and we know who wrote the (interruption). Huh? Don't give me this possible... I'm not interested in conspiracies now. We know that Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet. We know that Abe Lincoln wrote the Gettysburg Address. We know that Francis Scott Key wrote the Star-Spangled Banner. We know who wrote and authored "tear down this wall." But we don't know who came up with the phrase "undocumented immigrant." How did illegal alien morph into undocumented alien, into undocumented immigrant or into undocumented worker? They're illegal, plain and simple. But, "Oh, no, no, no! They're not illegal, Rush! They're just 'undocumented,' and they're 'workers,' and they are not aliens! They're not from space. They are immigrants, undocumented immigrants." Okay, indigenous peoples. Indigenous peoples. Okay, I guess those are the people that were here before we got here, and savaged the place. We brought syphilis. We introduced horses. We introduced racism, sexism, bigotry, homophobia and then we had the audacity to spread it to King Kahl

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